


You are Home, Now

by godofwine



Category: Lord of the Rings RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-24
Updated: 2010-12-24
Packaged: 2017-10-14 01:01:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,173
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/143627
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/godofwine/pseuds/godofwine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Geography doesn't lie.</p>
            </blockquote>





	You are Home, Now

*

Elijah's house is always cold even in the California summers. He keeps the air conditioning on at an inhuman 20 degrees and complains when Dom tries to turn it up.

Dom leaves dirty clothes everywhere except the hamper. "You never do the laundry anyway," he explains to Elijah.

They play music at 2 am and dance wildly in the living room. They go surfing on weekends and order pizza afterwards. They have ice cream in bed.

They live like children. They laugh like friends.

*

Billy visits them in December, and it is taken for granted that the Fellowship is together for a Christmas party. They drink too much and laugh too loudly so that the neighbours complain. Elijah gives them a bottle of good champagne and a kiss, and they are not bothered again.

Dom wakes at noon the next day and drags Billy shopping because it is Boxing Day in England. "It's our own holiday," he explains to a Billy who is more asleep than awake.

The malls are mostly empty, and their footsteps sound hollow after the Christmas rush.

Dom insists they present their gifts in surprise. "For tradition," he says. Billy buys him a girl's t-shirt with the Union Jack across the chest. _Where the breasts would be_ , Dom thinks.

Dom buys Billy a book on male pattern baldness and is promptly hit on the head with it. Dom knows Billy takes it in good fun, though, and he smiles at the perfection of their friendship.

They buy each other drinks at the bar down the road. "It's a celebration after all," Dom insists.

Dom has always liked that Billy can hold his own when it comes to alcohol, and they take their time, makes sure to enjoy the moment, but they do not drink enough to be rough and intrusive. _Only with each other_ , Dom will think later.

At three, they are one of the few remaining customers, and the bar is clearly closing. They order another pint anyway.

The waitress talks with a British accent and asks if "they aren't pissed enough?" She does not seem impatient, only amused.

She reminds Dom of home, and he says so, aloud, after she has left.

"But home is here now, I suppose," Billy responds.

"No. I mean, I'm British, I'm from Manchester."

"Yeah, but you _live_ in L.A."

"But I'm _from_ Manchester."

They elapse into silence, and Dom thinks for the first time that it is not the comfortable quiet of friendship. It is strained and telling.

Billy is looking away at the television screen when he asks, "Are you fucking Elijah then?" and Dom cannot help but think that it is unfair for Billy to play this card when he can't read the emotions in Billy's eyes.

"I don't see why you would think that at all," Dom answers after a pause.

"It seemed implied in the whole living arrangement."

"I don't see why you would think it's implied."

"Well, why are you here then?"

"That's not a logical question at all. Hollywood is filled with actors from other countries. I know a bloke who used to go to the same pub I did who's living down the street now."

"You said Manchester is _home_."

"Home has nothing to do with it!"

"Yeah, that's why I thought Elijah did."

"Well, he doesn't either."

It would be just like Billy to only look at him then with understanding and the smugness that accompanies understanding, without responding in words, which Dom can defeat.

Later, Dom will know he is being unfair to Billy who is really a good mate and trying to be supportive, but Dom hates Billy now for making him feel so foreign.

They leave the bar without really enjoying the last beer, and Dom blames Billy for ruining a perfectly perfect evening in questions.

When Dom is back at the flat, Elijah will be asleep on the couch with the television casting fantastical shadows on his face. For a moment, Dom is confused by Elijah's beauty and Billy's implications, but he refuses to believe himself so easily manipulated.

He pulls Billy to his room and kisses him on the mouth. He is not surprised to hear Billy laugh. "So that's why you’re not boffing Elijah then," Billy says still smiling and wipes his mouth with the back with back of his hand.

Dom can appreciate how easy it is to join him, lay back, sleep, and maintain the structure of their intimacy.

When Billy has returned to Scotland, Dom will receive a phone call unexpectedly. They will chat casually before Billy will apologize and say, "I've really handled that badly."

"You were probably just drunk," Dom will reply.

"No, I've been thinking about it for some time, but I suppose there's no real way to ask politely."

"I guess it's one of those things you're not supposed to ask."

“Yeah, you're probably right." Billy will change the subject to the script, and Dom will be quite thankful for him.

In Dom's bedroom now, Billy seems simpler, closer. Dom blames this on the ocean that separates them though he knows this is not exactly true.

In the morning, he will wake with Billy pressed firmly against him, and it will be the warmth of brothers.

*

In February, the days turn warm again, afternoons overcast and suffocating though it never seems to rain.

On Saturday, Dom tries to nap on the couch but it will be too rough and damp to be comfortable. He thinks of going out, clubbing, drinking, _anything_ , but all fun is lost in the lethargy of the too dense air.

In England, it would be still too cold to leave the house without a good jacket. Dom could walk (run if it is raining) to the corner pub where there is always a drink and a laugh waiting. He didn't own a car in England; there hadn't been much of a need for one.

He screams his frustration before sitting down to examine his foot. It doesn't hurt so much but the dent of plastic is as good of an excuse to stomp his foot and shout and act about five years old.

He screams his frustration before sitting down to examine his foot.

Elijah, who had been listening to music in the kitchen, comes to him as he is about the throw the whole system out the window.

"Hey! That's an important piece of equipment there!"

"Yeah, but it's not as important as my foot!"

He is angry and annoyed, pouting like a child, but he feels the frustration ebb away in the sparkle of society. Elijah is good for his nerves.

"You're just bitchy because you're not getting laid on Valentine's Day."

He has forgotten that it is indeed Valentine's Day. He says, "Neither are you."

Elijah only laughs, moment of decision in his eyes. Sparkle, sparkle, Dom can almost count his thoughts. Then, crawling closer, kisses him on the cheek, warm.

"We can remedy that," he whispers, and his breathe is soft, silky against Dom's ear.

Dom has been waiting for this, must have been, because the kiss is like relief. Feels it coming for months (years). Elijah's lips are not new.

Billy had known before Dom had been able to put the feelings into words.

Yearning almost. Expectation. Hint of taste at the back of his throat, too vague save for the metaphors of poetry. Disolving into similes, thinking in pictures, smelling smoke.

Harder, closer, slide of tongue. Progression in stages.

Hands sliding underneath his shirt, dancing across his skin. Leaves goose bumps and heat, contradictions, in their wake.

Dom should be helping, but he is enjoying being lazy. Lets Elijah explore, eyes closed, breathing.

Swaying slightly, concentrate. _Skin_ , he thinks, and hears Elijah's laughter.

"Bedroom?" Elijah asks against his stomach.

 _Now_ , he says. "Yes," aloud.

Fumble of buttons, turning on the lamp. Falling on to the bed in a heap of limbs and too clear lust.

Sees Elijah fully now, ruffled, flushed, _close_.

"God, you're so, so..." he tries to say.

"Sexy?"

Dom laughs, but he thinks _comfortable_ though he cannot explain why.

Afterwards, they bump foreheads in the softness of the night and Elijah whispers, "Happy Valentine's Day."

Dom laughs and says "thanks" and "you too" though he has never much believed in that holiday.

*

The first thing that Dom notices when he wakes is that he's alone in bed when he clearly remembers following asleep with a warm body. The second thing he notices, which was strangely not the first, is that there is a yellow post-it note stuck on his forehead.

The third thing he notices is that it itches slightly and crinkles loudly when he sneezes.

He spends the next minutes cross-eyed, reading backwards blue script through not quite transparent paper. He has managed to make out "ass" before Elijah comes back and takes the note from his head.

"I was reading that," he interjects but forgives Elijah for interrupting him because Elijah comes bearing coffee.

"Yeah, well you're not doing it correctly."

"I was doing just fine thanks."

"Yeah? What did it say then?"

Thinks for a moment. "’Dom, you have a sexy, sexy ass. Please ravish me muchly,’" he replies.

Elijah laughs before handing back the note. Dom allows himself to adjust to flowing script before breaking out a grin.

It says: _Step on my playstation again, and I'll kill you. Fuck me tonight?_

"I was partly right," he says. Inside, he thinks, _X-Box is better_.

"And what reward do you deserve for guessing correctly?" Elijah's voice has gone lower, rougher, older than the boy he had once known. _Playful_ , Dom thinks, and _sex, maybe_.

Dom pulls Elijah down to him, pushes up with hips and thighs and yeah, sex. "To ravish you muchly," he whispers against Elijah's throat, Elijah's pulse.

Elijah who is rocking back now, building up to a rhythm that they've learned in a day.

Pounding of blood, to his ears, to his _cock_ , and everything is _hothardwet_ , and god, he never thought it would be so quick to feel the rush of heat. Slide, push, and all the while, _harder_ , in his head, in his thrust.

Move, pulling Elijah closer, tighter. _Breathe_ , says his brain. _More_ , says his cock.

Dom is running down the long tunnel of the abandoned train tracks behind his childhood house. It's damp and dark and yet infinitely familiar ( _safe_ ), and as much as he wants to stay ( _please, god, please_ ), he sees the light of home ( _so close, come on_ ), bright.

 _White._

He runs and finally, he is outside beneath sun, and it surrounds him so completely, so immensely that for a moment he thinks he cannot see at all; he has forgotten in the darkness of the tunnel ( _home_ ).

He opens his eyes to Elijah's smile.

*

Dom visits Billy in Scotland in March because he has the time, and they are still the best of mates.

They surf and drink and flirt jokingly. Everything is so casual that Dom is almost tense from the expectation of confrontation.

It doesn't come, and Dom relaxes after the fourth day.

Billy knows of course (as he should), but he has gained the knowledge through subtle means.

 _Very proper_ , Dom thinks. _Billy should not have to ask._

He goes to Manchester afterwards because a vacation to the U.K. is never complete without a stop at his old flat.

His friends buy him drinks and share gossip and tell stories that he remembers too readily.

They laugh when he says "dude" or "yo" and call him a Yankee affectionately, jokingly. He feels the pull of their almost truth but shrugs it off easily.

Dom is not a man of slow contemplation. Instinct, he knows, is what he’s good at, and he trusts it more than the questions at the edge of his unconscious.

Later, they are enjoying the last pints of beer in the too warm bar. Someone asks, "Should we toast the queen, then?"

They laugh with the ease of an age old joke.

The flight back comes too quickly.

The flight lasts too long.

*

The plane lands at noon when the heat of the California sun is at its peak.

Dom rubs sleep from his eyes and grimaces in the thick Los Angeles air which he has forgotten after the sharpness of English rains. He needs to condition his body to the States again.

Elijah finds him when he pulls the last of his suitcases from the baggage claim. There is a hug waiting for him that he doesn't quite step into and a kiss that has been held back, he suspects.

"How was your flight?” Elijah asks, which Dom translates to _Are you OK?_

"Tiring, foods was terrible," he replies, which means just that.

"Well, at least you're home now."

"Yeah," Dom says, "home."

He kisses Elijah now, eagerly, sweetly, and tastes the cloves that only Elijah smokes and the scent of the Pacific.

He is smiling when he pulls back to see Elijah blush.

*


End file.
